Fido – Patron Saint For Our Business Name.

Mixed Hound Breed
One winter evening in 1941, not far from Florence in the lovely little city of Borgo San Lorenzo, a laborer named Carlo Soriani was returning home from work. When passing a little ravine, he heard a small yelp. Curious, he investigated and found an injured puppy. He brought him home and nursed him back to health. They became fast friends and the young dog followed him everywhere, so he named him Fido. He was a mixed breed, and generally looked like a hound. He was mostly white with some black patches, and his nose was always at work. As good dogs will do, he followed Carlo everywhere, including to the bus stop in the town square where Carlo took the early morning bus to work. Fido would hang around the square until Soriani returned on the evening bus where he was greeted with the unfettered joy that only a dog can muster. This went on for two years and became a well-known ritual in the square.

On December 30, 1943, the factories of Borgo San Lorenzo were bombed by the Allies, and Carlo Soriani was killed. Fido met the bus that day, of course, but the joy of greeting his master would never come again. Eventually Fido returned home to the Soriani home and Carlo’s wife, but the next afternoon Fido returned to meet the evening bus, and was again disappointed by every departing passenger. He returned the next day, and the next week, the next month, year and next DECADE. Fido met Carlo Soriano’s evening bus every day for the next 14 years – more than 5,000 days! Fido means “I am faithful”, 100 percent.

( Click here to visit Fido, immortalized in bronze, still waiting for his master’s return, in Google Street View).